


The Resident and the Regular

by mongoose_bite



Series: Dyce the Incredibly Easy Breton [26]
Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Anal Sex, Blackreach (Elder Scrolls), Blow Jobs, Clothed Sex, Competitive sex, Danger Kink, Dirty Talk, Edging, Exhibitionism, Facials, Frottage, M/M, Power Play, Public Sex, Switching, blackreach blacklight burkakke, erotic uses of destruction magic, erotic uses of luminous mushrooms, erotic uses of restoration magic, sex in dangerous places
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:08:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27519661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mongoose_bite/pseuds/mongoose_bite
Summary: Marcurio considers the Bee and Barb his true home. They miss him when he’s gone, they celebrate when he returns, and he has his pick of feisty adventuresses and alluring travellers perceptive enough not to be bamboozled by Brynjolf’s frankly amateurish attempts to be charming. And then Dyce shows up, quickly becoming a beloved regular, and makes it clear he has no need for a master of the arcane.Until he inevitably does. Marcurio can’t quite bring himself to turn Dyce down, but he definitely doesn’t intend to give him full service.
Relationships: Dovahkiin | Dragonborn/Marcurio, Male Dovahkiin | Dragonborn/Marcurio
Series: Dyce the Incredibly Easy Breton [26]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/29749
Comments: 9
Kudos: 58





	The Resident and the Regular

**Author's Note:**

> Marcurio was the first NPC I ever married in Skyrim (admittedly mostly for financial reasons,) and I always thought it was a bit of a shame Dyce never got to meet him, but he was never prompted and I never came up with a compelling idea for him until now. This was going to be a birthday present to myself but it's over two months late; it did get a bit away from me. I feel really rusty; it's been a tough year to write in, but I hope you folks enjoy regardless.
> 
> I've also probably taken a few liberties with Blackreach, but hey, so do the characters.

Marcurio was not exclusively a ladies’ man, but he generally found Nord fellows to be too unrefined for his tastes, and by dint of being in Skyrim, there weren’t often other options. True, there were some rather lithe and interesting men among the dark leather lot in the Ratway, but Marcurio suspected they’d all smell of lake water, and besides, he preferred not to take needless risks with his coin pouch.

Hence his well-earned reputation as a ladykiller.

He would have made an exception for the scruffily handsome Breton Brynjolf had successfully ambushed the moment he’d strolled in, only he soon learned that Dyce was apparently _everyone’s_ exception, something he appeared to accept as his due for merely existing.

Marcurio might have forgiven Dyce for his lack of discrimination, might have more than forgiven him because he was wearing Ratway leathers by now and they suited him very well, but then he finally had a chance to actually talk to the man.

Dyce was leaning on the bar chatting to Talen-Jei, one hip cocked, long legs wrapped in that Ratway leather. He was scruffy where Marcurio was sleek; stubbled and windburnt, his unkempt hair falling forward from behind his ears. Somehow he’d managed to catch enough sun that it was slightly bleached, in Skyrim of all places. Marcurio could well believe the sunlight loved him.

Marcurio anticipated it all as he made his way over; it had been too long since he’d kissed someone with stubble, played with an unfamiliar cock. He hoped his own reputation preceded him, but even if it didn’t, he had absolute confidence in his ability to seduce someone as approachable as Dyce.

As Marcurio expected, Dyce did not object to being approached. Not at all. Marcurio practically felt his gaze as it swept from eyes to feet and back again. He didn’t doubt Dyce liked what he saw; he knew how good he looked, his robes open to display his collarbones and just enough chest to prove he wasn’t hiding an undernourished scholar’s body, but the kind of long, lean build that allowed him to keep pace with the most dauntless and brawny of his clients. In every sense. He was quite proud of his eyes that gleamed gold when the light was right, and brown skin the firelight polished like it loved him alone.

Dyce was almost as handsome, Marcurio decided. Between them it would probably come down to personal taste. Between them, when Marcurio finally put his own elbow on the bar, wasn’t much space at all.

Dyce had started smiling before he’d completed his inspection of the mage. It seemed he’d never not welcomed an intrusion, eyebrows raised in pleased enquiry, his attention holding the same weight and feeling of wealth as gold itself. Marcurio had seen men and women of various races all utterly disarmed by his effortless charm.

Marcurio was made of sterner stuff; he was certainly prepared to be charmed, but pride demanded he gave as good as he got.

They understood each other, and even though Marcurio gave his name and Dyce responded in kind, the question and the answer didn’t need words. A nudge, a grin. Dyce made it easy.

If Marcurio had simply left it at that, things would have been more than fine, but he was a professional. Money was what he lived for, a measure of his success, so he didn’t think twice about launching into his sales pitch first, just in case Dyce was interested in employing him. He had zero rules against fraternising with his clients; in fact he made a point of it if they were to his taste. Especially on the job.

It wasn’t a _thing_. Not really. He would have denied it if asked, but a fuck was that much more intense when death had just been denied, magical discharge still hanging in the air, and the danger wasn’t quite gone. Even better if it despoiled some spectacular location. Marcurio considered his performances worthy of the best stages. In this case, however, it didn’t seem to be on the cards.

“How much do you charge?” Dyce asked and Marcurio could tell he wasn’t really interested, just being polite. Nevertheless, Marcurio told him.

“Five hundred gold?” Dyce exclaimed. The notion seemed to amaze him.

“With a master of the arcane to protect your back-”

And then Dyce started laughing, throwing his head back in genuine mirth and Marcurio shut his jaw with a snap. Marcurio’s eyes narrowed in annoyance and Dyce took a step back from the bar, holding out his hands like he was fending off one of those doe-eyed priestesses from the Temple of Mara who separated men from coin more efficiently than Maven herself and got thanked for it.

“Oh, no no no. No, thank you. No magic for me.”

So that was it. Another idiot like all the other idiots in Skyrim who thought magic was beneath them, or infectious or something. Dyce wasn’t to know he’d prodded a fairly sore spot, and Marcurio didn’t give him the satisfaction of letting him find out. He politely disengaged and retreated, wondering why he bothered with this backwards province.

Dyce attempted to apologise, but Marcurio’s towering pride was not so easily soothed. He wasn’t _that_ attractive; Marcurio could live without him.

He did his best to ignore Dyce after that, but some things were unignorable, like the fact everyone seemed to assume that they must have gone upstairs together at some point, and if they hadn’t they were clearly rivals.

“So it’s _unresolved_ ,” Keerava purred at him delightedly. She loved Dyce; he spent gold like it was water and his example often encouraged others to do the same.

“It’s resolved,” Marcurio said with a shrug, glancing over at Dyce because he was furniture; he had no reason to avoid looking at him. He didn’t care that much. Dyce would have a smile for Marcurio on the occasions their eyes met, but read his disinterest loud and clear and never approached him.

Until the day he did, of course.

Dyce wasn’t the first person to ridicule Marcurio’s suggestion that they might need some magical muscle only to come back later with a changed perspective, but he was probably the most cheerful about it. No bluster or prevaricating. He marched into the inn one afternoon, looked around until he spotted the mercenary mage and made a bee-line for him, sliding into the chair opposite.

“I take it back, I need a master of the arcane,” he said quickly. “Not even a master, honestly, I don’t think I can be picky about this.”

Marcurio seriously considered declining immediately, but that would be unprofessional. Instead he took a leisurely pull of his drink, allowed himself a few moments of silent schadenfreude as he made Dyce wait for his answer, a faintly supercilious smile on his face.

“My services are currently unengaged. You know my price.”

“Well, I don’t actually have five hundred gold.”

“Then you don’t have me.”

Dyce looked thoughtful. “Do you take anything other than coin?”

Marcurio knew what he meant, and smirked. “Sometimes, but not in exchange for services.”

Dyce grinned, and Marcurio reminded himself to be careful. He also noticed it was the first smile he’d seen from Dyce today, and that was unusual.

“I guess I’m just a soft touch. That’s probably why I don’t have five hundred gold.” He drummed his fingers on the table for a moment. “You know, I don’t actually want five hundred gold worth of work from you. There’s no danger or anything. Just an errand, really. I could give you, like, one hundred gold?” Marcurio snorted. “And any gold we find on the way. You can have all of it.”

“If it’s just an errand how likely is it we’ll find any gold on the way?” He must be desperate, and Marcurio found himself curious as to why.

“It might go horribly wrong. Things like this usually do.”

He still had no intention of taking Dyce up on his offer, but by now he had to know what the job actually was. “Why do you need a mage for an errand anyway? I thought you could do without the arcane.”

“I have to go to the Mages’ College in Winterhold,” Dyce said grumpily. “And Enthir says if he sees me there again he’ll kill me. I don’t want to go there myself anyway. Not through the front door.”

“I have no idea who Enthir is but I trust his judgement already. You do understand I’m not a thief.”

“I just need information.”

“On what?”

Dyce glanced around and leaned forward and despite himself Marcurio leaned in as well, catching the smell of worn leather and dust and horse; Dyce had come to him straight from the open road.

“I need to find an Elder Scroll,” he whispered.

It sounded fake to Marcurio and he snorted. “Never heard of it.”

Dyce heaved a sigh and prepared to stand up, “I’d be surprised if you had. Anyway, I can’t offer you money I don’t have, so I suppose I’ll find someone else.”

Marcurio frowned at Dyce’s presumption of his ignorance. “That’s an incredibly transparent tactic.”

“If I had the full amount I’d pay it.” Dyce shrugged.

Truth was, Marcurio believed him; he found it almost unbearable to watch how easily Dyce and his coin were separated.

“Wait.”

Dyce did so, his hand still on the back of his chair.

“Who else did you ask about this thing?”

Dyce shifted his jaw before answering, “A greybeard and a member of the Blades,” he said.

That took the wind out of Marcurio’s sails, and he started wracking his brains more seriously. What the _fuck_ is an Elder Scroll? How could Dyce be after it? Marcurio doubted Dyce had the magical ability to so much as light a candle. Maybe he should try the College himself, just to find out.

If he took the job, at least he’d get some pay for it.

“One hundred gold and I get first pick of anything we find on the way.”

Dyce perked up immediately. “You’ll take the job? Wonderful! Here you go.”

He emptied his pockets of currency, and thus Marcurio was obliged to pay for him when they took the cart to Winterhold.

The job went as smooth as butter. Marcurio left Dyce flirting with some Altmer in The Frozen Hearth, and after reluctantly enrolling at the College without issue he was granted access to both the librarian and the library.

A day later, he had copious notes and a dilemma. Elder Scrolls did indeed seem to exist, in fact they apparently existed more fiercely than the rest of reality. The trouble was he was quite sure Dyce was the absolutely last person who should get his hands on one. Powerful magic was often more dangerous in the hands of well-meaning idiots than those who meant ill.

Not that he expected it to go that far. In the unlikely event Dyce found the thing, it would almost certainly incinerate his mind instantly.

Marcurio’s real task was to convince him of this fact.

He failed. Dyce simply wouldn’t listen to a word he said until he divulged the location of the researcher who might know more, something Dyce forced him to admit he was contractually obliged to do. Dyce grew thin-lipped and annoyed, and Marcurio, reflecting on things a bit later, may have cast one too many aspersions on his lack of brainpower out of sheer frustration.

But it wasn’t like he was wrong; it would take a highly-trained mind to even begin to handle-

Dyce left. The awful weather obliged him by supplying a dramatic swirl of snow and a wind-slammed door as he did so.

Marcurio had missed the cart back to Riften and so he was resigned to spending another night in Winterhold. After a hot meal and a drink he’d mellowed out a bit; the odds of Dyce making any real progress were pretty long, even if the researcher was still alive and of a mind to aid him.

He felt reassured. At least until he fell into conversation with the Altmer, to whom Dyce apparently supplied surplus daedric artefacts on a regular basis. He doubted he’d ever see the Breton again, and silently raised a glass to the soon-to-be-departed, mostly out of guilt.

He saw him the next day while he waited for the cart to be loaded.

Dyce was leaving Birna’s Oddments with his pack piled high with gear. He didn’t seem to notice Marcurio in the small crowd queuing for the cart and he consulted his map before leaving town on foot, heading west on a narrow path into the mountains.

Marcurio stared after him with a horrible sinking feeling that he was about to do something without being paid for it first, and he stomped into Birna’s Oddments to pick up some supplies.

The weather was clear, if cold, and Dyce wasn’t trying to hide his tracks. Marcurio kept well back so he could have muttered arguments with himself about how stupid an idea this was and how irritating Dyce was and how he should have just told him to piss off from the start.

Dyce’s destination turned out to be a Dwemer ruin, a couple of ancient stone and metal towers overlooking a deep, icy ravine, connected by swaying rope bridges built far more recently and with far less skill. Marcurio caught his breath and waited for Dyce to disappear inside before following.

Marcurio quite liked Dwemer ruins. They aroused a good deal of intellectual curiosity in him, and they were often much warmer than caves or tombs, which was ideal should other forms of arousal take place within them.

This particular ruin, however, was not warm at all. It was practically an ice cave, and Marcurio pulled his robe closer around himself as he picked his way through the remains of some sort of expedition. When he entered the Dwemer complex itself he heard shouting from up ahead. He watched from afar as the Khajiit ambushed Dyce; a battle the defender won handily, and Dyce stooped to rifle through the pockets of his slain foe. Marcurio smiled faintly. Adventurers were all alike. And lucky for him too; their magpie habits paid his fees, after all.

Dyce continued gamely on, blades drawn now, moving quietly.

His next attackers were not half-starved skooma addicts. They were Dwemer automatons, built to far outlast their creators. They unfolded themselves with a hiss of steam and rolled forward to attack from both sides. Enchanted steel met dwarven metal and sparks flew as Dyce parried and spun, elegant and swift, side-stepping and dodging like his life depended on it. Which it did, more or less; leather armour was barely better than nothing against relentless killing machines. A solid hit would skewer him.

Marcurio spent a great deal of his time watching people fight, and in Dyce’s case it was truly a pleasure to see him in action, although he hadn’t expected any different given his reputation. Regardless of his obvious skill, it was clearly a fight that was testing him, Dyce constantly forced to defend himself, watching two opponents at once.

Which was why it was so useful to have a master of the arcane on your side. Marcurio raised his hands and a bolt of lightning zipped out of them, forked, and punched into the constructs on either side of Dyce, a rumble of thunder in its wake.

As Marcurio expected, Dyce took full advantage of their disrupted systems, slicing into their weak points with precision born of past experience and the centurions slumped forward on their spheres with a hiss of steam.

Dyce cocked a hip and an eyebrow and waited for Marcurio to approach, the back of one of his blades resting casually on his shoulder.

“See? I knew you cared.”

Marcurio mustered a furious scowl in response, but the genuine warmth in Dyce’s voice threw him off slightly. Weren’t they supposed to be arguing?

“I would feel mildly responsible for your death, and for some reason a lot of people would miss you. I am not one of them.” He hurried on before Dyce could reply. “This is business, as well. You promised me any extra gold we find and you have four hundred still on your tab.”

“That seems fair.”

“It does?”

“Well, it appears I’m now getting your Full Service, aren’t I? Help yourself,” he said with a sly smile.

Marcurio regarded him suspiciously but decided not to argue, and they pressed on together.

They moved forward quickly, Marcurio quite enjoying the novelty of opening chests himself and scooping coins into his bag, rummaging through the rest while Dyce was obliged to wait his turn.

At least until Dyce started bounding past locked chests without bothering to open them.

“Why should I?” he grinned, when Marcurio called him on it. “There’s nothing in it for me.”

“I’m not taking _everything_. I’m an apprentice wizard, not a pack mule.” He was already regretting some of his choices, although he refused to admit it. He’d try and lighten his load when Dyce wasn’t watching.

“Are you?” Dyce asked and Marcurio opened his mouth to fire back when he added, “You seem a bit more powerful than an apprentice.”

“Oh. Well, that’s because I spend my time practising in the field. Not a single client has asked after my qualifications since I arrived in Skyrim, so I don’t see any reason to sit for an exam now.”

“I suppose not.”

The expedition had not fared well, and most of the traps and automatons were still active, although it appeared it was the Falmer they were least prepared for. Marcurio watched the dark corners warily, not just because Dyce kept disappearing into them and then exploding blades first into an unsuspecting Dwemer robot.

In the depths of the ruin they found the last two members of the expedition having an argument that quickly escalated into a fight to the death. The victor noticed them watching and ignored Dyce’s attempt to make peace.

“Mages.” Dyce sighed, when the blonde Imperial was dead on the floor.

“And I suppose thieves never turn on their fellows.”

“Of course they do, but it’s considered bad business to do so before you’ve secured the loot.”

“Speaking of which, we seem to have reached a dead end, and no scroll,” Marcurio said, with some relief.

“Let’s see if this thing works then,” Dyce said, and produced a metallic sphere from his pack. He grinned when the door activated in response, and the way ahead opened.

Marcurio’s heart quickened too; whatever was beyond here they were the first ones to see it for who knew how long.

They waited as the mechanism descended, silent and tense. Marcurio was starting to try and calculate which province was actually on the other side of the world when they halted with a clunk, and the doors opened.

For a moment Marcurio thought he was looking up at the stars before he realised they were nuggets of glowing ore studding the ceiling of an absolutely colossal cave. A Dwemer city rose in front of them, spires and towers and bridges unchanged since their builders vanished. 

Underground farmlands stretched off to the shores of a gently glowing river that disappeared down an even deeper chasm below the city, spray hanging in the air, the waterfall too distant for them to hear. Towering mushrooms, as big as the ones Marcurio heard wizards in Morrowind made towers of, but far more gaudy, gave off a bright blue and purple light eclipsed only by the dazzling illumination of vast crystals that sprouted from the ground and cave walls. The air was strangely humid and thick for a cave, and hazy with spores in the distance, like pinkish fog.

Marcurio was distantly aware of Dyce standing next to him just as awestruck as he was as they tried to take it all in. Their eyes met and he suspected he wore the same expression of bewildered delight as Dyce did.

“Look at that,” Dyce pointed at the city. “It looks like the sun.” Between the towers he could see a great glowing globe held in a latticework of metal struts.

“They made their own,” Marcurio said, desperate to instantly be there, to be everywhere, to gulp down the knowledge and spectacle of this place. This alone made coming to Skyrim worth it.

“I hope you packed well; this could take days.” Dyce didn’t seem upset by the prospect, and Marcurio was equally keen to spend some time here.

“If they’re growing those things.” He waved his hand at the farmland, “They’re probably edible. I’m sure we’ll manage.”

Dyce pointed at the steaming metal sphere in front of the doorway to a nearby dwarven farmhouse. “Hey, can you hit that one?”

Marcurio rolled his eyes. “Of course I can.” Lightning crackled from his fingers and the sphere unfolded itself for battle.

“My turn,” Dyce said, and wrenched down the lever on the Dwemer machine on the platform next to them. He whooped with delight when it worked, and three heavy metal bolts slammed into the sphere centurion, punching through it and into the doorway behind it with a clanging sound that left their ears ringing as it died away.

Dyce laughed and vaulted over the railing to investigate the damage. Marcurio glanced around and followed.

“I wonder what they were so afraid of. That’s a lot of weapons pointed at this one farmhouse,” Marcurio pointed out.

“That’s a very good point. Let’s find out.” Dyce shoved the dead centurion out of the way, and opened the rather dented door.

Marcurio heard a familiar sound. One that flooded him with nostalgia.

“Nirnroot!” he said, joining Dyce in the farmhouse which was clearly set up as an alchemist’s laboratory. Only a long-decayed skeleton remained of the alchemist, which Dyce prodded with his blade to make sure would stay dead.

Marcurio approached the humming potplant on the workbench. “I used to go looking for nirnroot when I was a child. I thought it only grew in Cyrodil. Although I’ve never seen one with red leaves.”

“Apparently that’s why they were here to investigate it,” Dyce said, paging through a leatherbound journal. “You can have the plant if you like.”

“That is what we agreed,” Marcurio reminded him. He plucked the red nirnroot and Dyce handed him the journal. “May as well keep the instructions too, such as they are.”

They didn’t linger long in the farmhouse and Dyce suggested following the road for now. It had to take them to the city eventually.

Half an hour later they passed under a bridge that spanned the road between two guard houses, and right into a Falmer ambush. Marcurio reacted like the seasoned professional he was and chained his lightning through their pale, scrawny bodies and ducking for cover from the rain of arrows in response. Dyce had vanished.

No, there he was, kicking a corpse down off the bridge; Marcurio hadn’t even seen him climb up. He flung his lightning around Dyce, who didn’t even look at him, focused on the enemy. They stormed the guard towers that flanked the bridge, routing the Falmer. The blood they spilled looked black in this strange light.

Marcurio appreciated Dyce’s casual trust, and repaid him with perfectly-aimed spells. The last rumbles of thunder died away, and nothing else rushed out to attack them. Dyce waited at the top of the stairs down, flicking blood off his blades and waiting for Marcurio to catch up.

He glanced over his shoulder. “You’re the most skilled mage I’ve ever met,” he said sincerely, and trotted down before Marcurio could respond.

Marcurio swallowed thickly, feeling heat creep over his cheeks. He was used to compliments but had been caught completely off-guard by this one, so casual and honest, and so well aimed. This man is _dangerous_ , he reminded himself.

So am I; maybe I should try and prove it.

He hurried down the steps.

“They’ll know we’re here by now. You’re not very quiet,” Dyce said. “Let’s go around for now rather than walking in along the main road. I don’t want to fight a whole city of Falmer, and I’d like to get a closer look at the scenery anyway.”

They left the road and set out for the edge of the cavern, winding their way around clusters of glowing mushrooms and losing sight of the faux sun. Marcurio started hunting for more red nirnroot and Dyce was happy to help him, which wasn’t how it was supposed to work with a client, but who cared?

Dyce appeared and disappeared from view as they explored the luminescent forest, leaving dark footprints in soft patches of mud that glowed bright green with algae, and wading through thick, phosphorescent mists. Although often out of sight, Marcurio discovered Dyce was rarely out of mind. He was even more attractive here, focused and lethal, than he was in the inn. Marcurio appreciated competency almost as much as physical beauty, and Dyce was more capable than his easygoing first impressions suggested.

Marcurio had underestimated him. To be fair he had also underestimated Marcurio, but Dyce had admitted as such, and Marcurio wondered if he should do the same. His insulting laughter all those weeks ago seemed ridiculously inconsequential now, in the wake of the words _most skilled mage_. Marcurio kept turning them over in his head as if they were precious gems.

It wasn’t like he hadn’t realised he was exploring the most fantastic location in the province with a very attractive and available adventurer. Every glimmering pool, every mushroom bower and every glittering cave wall offered the possibility of an encounter which-

I’m being seduced! Marcurio realised. He’d been staring blankly at a nirnoot while his mind furnished him with fantasies and his cock stirred beneath his clothes. He wrenched the plant out of the ground. Being seduced he didn’t mind, but being seduced accidentally was another thing all together. He knew Dyce was not trying to fuck him; he’d been told no, and only needed to hear it once.

He’d change his mind if Marcurio did, probably, but where was the fun in that? Marcurio wandered on, wondering how you’d seduce someone who’d say yes the moment you asked, wouldn’t it be more fun to dance around it, push and pull and flirt? But it would be a crying shame of a lifetime to leave this place completely unsullied.

Marcurio paused. Where was Dyce anyway? He hadn’t seen him for a little while.

He’d barely had time to frame the thought when he heard the man in question yell in pain and start swearing.

Some mercenary I am, Marcurio berated himself, and started running. He’d feared the Falmer had tracked them down, but instead found Dyce being stalked and circled by several large, aggressive chaurus. Dyce was trying to dodge the great gouts of acid they were spitting at him, not always with success, and darting in close to take stabs at their large pincered heads.

“Sorry I’m late.”

Marcurio arrived like an oncoming storm, lightning streaking through the massive insects, making them recoil, staggering them and pushing them back.

Dyce knew how to take advantage, and he pressed his attacks, looking for soft spots between the plates of chitin. The air was thick with the smell of acid. Marcurio spotted several more scuttling down from high up on the cavern wall. Lightning flashed and they fell, landing with chittering thuds, their many legs already underneath them. Dyce put his blade right through the mouth of his current opponent, yanked it out and ran, grabbing at Marcurio’s robe as he dashed past.

“We don’t have to fight them. Let’s just go!”

Marcurio instantly saw the wisdom of it, and fell in behind him, raising a shield with the last of his magicka, as bucketfuls of acid spit frothed on the ground and melted holes in the mushrooms around them.

Once out of range Marcurio dropped the shield and concentrated on running, his gaze more or less resting on Dyce’s leather-clad arse. Eventually they slowed to a jog, and then to a halt, on some distant shore of the river that encircled the city. They were further away than ever, but the chaurus seemed to have given up the chase. Marcurio dumped his pack on the ground with a groan. Definitely too much junk in there.

Marcurio’s reserves of magic had replenished themselves even while his breath still rasped in his throat, and he stepped up to Dyce and raised his hand, almost instinctively, as he realised the side of the Breton’s face was acid burned and raw; practically a crime on such an example of nature’s art.

He paused. Marcurio didn’t offer restoration services because he couldn’t honestly say he was very good at it, and he never over-promised.

Dyce himself looked surprised, with the side of his face that still worked at least, his chest still heaving. But he didn’t move away.

Oh, fuck it. Maybe he was weak. He tilted his hand to cup Dyce’s face, his fingers hovering an inch or two over Dyce’s skin. He concentrated, and let healing magic flow, warm and golden from his palm. It wasn’t his speciality; he had no finesse, just the brute force of will and magic on flesh.

It worked well enough, but not quickly, and he smoothed his fingers through the air near Dyce’s cheek and jaw

“I do have plenty of potions,” Dyce began.

“Dyce, just let me.”

Dyce tilted his head slightly so Marcurio could reach his jaw, pouring magic on the angry red spots where the acid had dripped off his face, shrinking them until it was as if they’d never been. Face to face like this, Marcurio could see how Dyce’s eyes caught the light here, turning an unnaturally bright shade of blue. He was only slightly shorter than the Imperial; their breath mingled, still deep and slightly ragged.

Marcurio glanced down at the ragged spots on Dyce’s armour where the acid had splashed up his arm.

“Hand,” he said, and Dyce raised it so he could heal it, his own hovering over Dyce’s healing skin.

“I’m getting some confusing messages here,” Dyce said quietly. He hadn’t caught his breath yet, and Marcurio decided he wasn’t going to let him if he could help it. It was ridiculous to stumble around pining, and dangerous too.

It was time to take the edge off.

Marcurio let the spell cease and lowered his hands, the glow fading. Dyce was smiling faintly, basking in Marcurio’s personal space, waiting. Marcurio wasn’t going to let him have it all his own way.

He leaned in, waiting for Dyce’s chin to tilt and his lips to part slightly before he leaned further past his waiting lips and murmured into his ear instead.

“Have you ever been seduced, Dyce? I’ve been wondering if you ever held back long enough to let it happen.”

“Um, I’m pretty sure-”

“Propositioning and seduction are two _very_ different things.” He kept his voice low.

“Are they? Perhaps you need to explain the difference.” Dyce asked innocently. “Maybe you could be my first,” he purred, far less innocently.

Marcurio chuckled, and shook his head. “That wouldn’t be a challenge, but merely an accident of circumstance. I intend to be your _best_.” So saying he turned his head, ghosting his lips across his own handiwork on Dyce’s cheek, and pressed a kiss to his mouth that was more of a slow bite, tongue and teeth, like he was savouring the first Summerset peach of the season.

But he only allowed a taste. Dyce chased him a fraction as he drew back, his teeth pulling for a moment at Dyce’s lower lip, and then he was out of reach.

“You smell like chaurus spit,” Marcurio said in a normal tone, turning away to survey the possibilities of their current location.

“Can’t argue with that. It’s all over my armour.”

Marcurio glanced over his shoulder. “Do something about it then,” he said, and walked off. This rather gravelly beach wouldn’t have been his first choice, but there looked to be some deeper, softer sand at the base of one of those mushrooms, and some decent light at least.

It would do.

He turned and faced Dyce, who raised an eyebrow and started taking off his gloves. He did appreciate the grace with which Dyce relinquished the lead, but this was far too slow, Marcurio thought. Time to give him some encouragement.

Marcurio’s long, skilled fingers crept up his torso, flicking catches and loosening ties, his eyes fixed firmly on Dyce, making sure he was paying close attention to the performance Marcurio had long perfected. When his robes were starting to hang loose and his fingers brushed his own collarbones, he moved his hand to the large metal brooch at his left shoulder, and unlatched it with a metallic snick. He smiled.

Marcurio turned away gracefully as he let the heavy, multi-layered robe drop away from his body. It was not a thing of beauty, this robe; three layers thick to deflect glancing blows and defend against Skyrim’s brutal cold, but spread out across almost any surface it was surprisingly comfortable. It was also warm enough that Marcurio could get away with wearing nothing but a tailored shirt and breeches underneath, an outfit that would have been perfectly acceptable in any Imperial City bar, and honestly far too good for any Skyrim equivalent. Much like Marcurio considered himself. He bent over as he spread his robe out across the sand, putting his long legs and toned arse on display.

He kept his back to Dyce when he straightened up. He didn’t want to look too obvious, and the stays on his trousers were starting to strain. Instead he reached up and untied his hair, shaking it out with some relief.

Several soft thuds indicated Dyce had scattered boots definitely, pack definitely, jacket probably so Marcurio wasn’t surprised when bare arms wound around his waist and Dyce’s stubble prickled his shoulder through his shirt as he rested his chin there.

“This is seduction? I like it,” Dyce murmured, angling his hips against Marcurio’s backside to prove it. Marcurio swallowed a mouthful of spit and resisted the urge to just kneel down and let Dyce have his way with him. Later. They could be down here a while, and for now he was the one seducing.

He arranged his face into an expression of lustful disapproval and turned in Dyce’s arms, placing his hands against his chest, but didn’t push him away. He didn’t smell of chaurus acid now at least. Marcurio ran his hands across the sparse hair of his chest and up over his shoulders, to pull him in for more than a bite this time. Maybe the whole peach; sucking out the stone.

Marcurio let Dyce get comfortable with his tongue in his mouth, let Dyce untuck his shirt and then squeeze his arse as they stood at the edge of the spread robe, but before Dyce could slip a hand down his pants he summoned fire beneath his fingertips and dug them into Dyce’s shoulders, pulling them down his back.

Dyce groaned comfortably at the warmth, and Marcurio could feel his back muscles flex as he rolled his shoulders. It took a fair amount of control to generate heat rather than flame, and Marcurio felt Dyce begin to relax and melt against him as he massaged his back.

For his next trick he slid a hand down Dyce’s neck, letting the fire spell fade while maintaining it with his other hand, and when he brushed his fingers across his nipples, they were laced with frost.

Dyce gasped and shuddered, and Marcurio pulled him in close, his fingers still hot on the back of his neck, “I told you I was a master of the arcane.”

“So you did,” Dyce said, rather breathlessly, and Marcurio felt his stomach muscles quiver as he ran his hand further down. But he didn’t pull back, his eyes on Marcurio’s face as he felt for the ridge of Dyce’s cock through his leather pants, palming it and cupping his fingers underneath the seam of his Ratway leather trousers.

Marcurio bit his lip. This next bit would be tricky. Dyce was trusting him with his nuts, after all.

His fingers pulled a spark of lightning out of the weave of the world.

“Fffffaaak,” Dyce spasmed and jerked away, his knees buckling, and Marcurio helped him down, taking some of his weight as he sank down onto the robe. “I thought I was gonna-” he gasped.

“You’ll have to wait a bit for _that,_ ” Marcurio smirked. It was possible to yank an orgasm out of someone that way, but it wasn’t particularly satisfying or pleasant.

Dyce lay back on the robe, propped up on his elbows, watching Marcurio stand over him and still game for whatever Marcurio wanted next. It was lovely to play with someone so adventurous.

“It’s easier without clothes,” Marcurio said, as he pulled off his shirt and tossed it aside. “I can be more accurate.” He held his hands out and made a spark jump between his thumb and fingers with a snapping sound.

“You are _very_ accurate,” Dyce said, and undid the buttons on his fly before lifting his hips and removing the rest of his apparel.

He had such a pretty cock, flushed and hard and gleaming, and Marcurio sank to his knees between Dyce’s legs and fondled him without magic for a moment. Oh, he’d missed this. He ran his hands over Dyce’s hip bones, through the line of hair on his stomach, the flat, firm planes of his chest, alternating hot and cold and sometimes leaning forward to kiss a patch of skin, finding faint freckles in the bluish light whenever he did so.

What a curse it would be, he thought, to confine oneself to adoring one kind of body. He’d missed men. Dyce undulated beneath him, running his fingers through Marcurio’s long hair, brushing it away from his face, tucking it behind his ears as Marcurio sought out where he liked it cold and where he preferred it warm and only occasionally making him jump.

“Seduced yet?” Marcurio asked, when he was finally against Dyce’s lips.

“I might be,” Dyce panted.

Marcurio didn’t have infinite reserves of magic, or patience, and he glanced down between them, where Dyce’s cock bobbed freely against his own stomach and his own stretched his linen trousers as far as they were prepared to go.

“I didn’t exactly bring-”

Dyce snorted and reached under the small of his back to find where the bottle had got to. He pressed it into Marcurio’s palm, leaving it up to him what he did with it. Marcurio mentally conceded him the point. He could afford to.

He shuffled back down Dyce’s body, trailing fingers of frost and fire as he did so, and Dyce spread his knees wider. He kept his fingers warm as he drenched them in oil, and Dyce accommodated them with a gasp and a smile.

“Can you do that with your dick, too?”

Marcurio stilled, two knuckles deep in Dyce, and stared at him, trying to work out how to cross the fathomless gulf of ignorance that clearly existed between them.

“No. What? No!”

“I was only asking- guh!” His hips jerked upwards as Marcurio applied the spark of life to Dyce’s balls again. “Fuck!” He thumped his head back in frustration.

“As you wish,” Marcurio said. He tugged loose the stays on his trousers one-handed, as he didn’t want to get oil on them so far from a laundry service, and finally freed his aching cock. After a moment’s thought he undid the rest and tugged the breeches down over his hips and halfway over the curve of his arse so he could reach into them and free his balls as well.

“Very nice,” Dyce said, up on his elbows again to watch the show. Marcurio was more used to compliments like that one and merely smiled knowingly as he took his cock in hand to give it an oil-soaked squeeze for a moment before rubbing it against Dyce’s arse.

He held off on the magic for now. It was magic enough to make Dyce’s body slowly yield for him, Dyce’s legs wrapping around his hips, pulling him in.

Marcurio was gasping now, and he started rocking his hips forward slightly, almost without realising it. Dyce met him thrust for thrust, the cocky bastard convinced he knew how it would go from here.

Marcurio let him for a while, letting his reserves build up, enjoying the sound of skin slapping skin, even as his trousers threatened to cut off circulation to his legs. Dyce started making soft moaning sounds, his eyes mostly closed, and Marcurio knew he wasn’t going to last long either, sucking his breath in through gritted teeth.

He curled forward, still fucking, and flexed his fingers one last time. He slid his hand under Dyce’s cock, pressing his palm hard on the stomach beneath it, and forced raw healing power into his skin. Dyce’s eyes flew open and he arched his back, taking the names of several Divines in vain. As the spell surged through Dyce’s body Marcurio could feel it through his own cock deep inside him, something less intense than electricity, deeply pleasurable in a completely different way.

Marcurio squeezed his eyes shut and hissed and gasped through his teeth as he poured all of his reserves through his hands, the other one squeezing Dyce’s cock.

Marcurio was coming, driving his hips forward again and again, seeking to pour out all his power before it grew too much. Finally, gasping and still twitching he toppled forward, his cheek against Dyce’s chest. He could feel the heart hammering within it, as well as the sticky mess between them.

They caught their breath for the second time on that beach, and Marcurio heaved himself upright. He noticed the come on his hands glowing slightly in the weird blue light.

He staggered to his feet and reeled over to the river to wash it off, and make some attempt to keep his trousers clean as he tucked himself away and re-fastened them.

“Don’t you dare,” he said, turning to see Dyce pick up his shirt with an intent look.

Dyce laughed, and tossed it to him, and used his own to wipe himself down.

Dyce collected his belongings while Marcurio shook out his robe and put it back on. The bottle of oil went into a pocket.

“My armour is still covered in chaurus goo,” Dyce said. “I don’t suppose you can magic it away.”

“Magic can’t do everything.”

“Nevertheless,” Dyce said, sliding back into his filthy armour. “It does a lot more than I ever expected it would. I’ve learned a lot.”

“Perhaps you’d like another lesson soon.”

“Perhaps.” Dyce stretched and hefted his pack. “Maybe a massage at the end of a long day, too.”

“That is not part of the service,” Marcurio grumbled, but he couldn’t keep the smile out of his voice or the spring from his step as they moved on.

There was no way of keeping track of time down here, but Marcurio was very ready to stop walking when Dyce spotted a series of glowing, steaming pools overhung with a profusion of mushrooms. Even the air was warmer here, the scent of minerals and fungi thick.

They took the precaution of scouring the area for signs of chaurus or Falmer before Dyce declared the nearest patch of clear ground a campsite, and shrugged off his pack.

Marcurio was happy to agree, and he set his pack down and started searching though it for some food while Dyce waded into the nearest steaming pool, and dipped his hand in the water. Marcurio watched him taste it.

“Any good?”

Dyce pulled a face.

“I don’t think it’ll kill us, but it’s got a lot of minerals in it; I’d drink from our supplies first. Nice and warm though.”

“Well scrub your leather in a different one then, I’m going for a soak.”

Marcurio placed his dinner on a rock within easy reach of the pool and stripped off, while Dyce sighed and relocated to a pool formed by the overflow to clean his armour and wash his shirt, which he draped over a rock to dry.

Marcurio groaned and sank into the faintly luminescent water. When he scooped it up, the drops glimmered on his skin for a few moments before fading.

He’d nearly fallen asleep, the water up to his neck when Dyce sloshed in, creating enough waves to submerge his face for a moment. Marcurio spluttered and wanted to be annoyed as Dyce explored the pool like an otter but he couldn’t muster any enthusiasm for it. His mood was too good, and he was now amply furnished with glimpses of Dyce’s naked body as he frolicked.

“Have you eaten?” Marcurio asked, when Dyce completed his inspection and floated across from him.

“Yeah, I didn’t want to get crumbs in the water.”

Dyce reached up to touch one of the little mushrooms that grew in great glowing clumps around the edge of the springs.

“Do you think they’re poisonous?”

“The alchemist might tell us,” Marcurio said. He got out of the water and went over to his pack, shivering slightly as he dried off and shrugged on his robe, not bothering to tie it. He’d been planning on studying the notebook anyway, and he flipped through it while Dyce soaked in the spring.

“Not poisonous,” he called after a while. “Similar to other species in Morrowind, but the minerals here have had an effect… What are you doing?”

Dyce was closing one eye and sticking his tongue out as far as it would go, still standing waist deep in the spring.

“Tynna, ‘ee if icks ‘owing,” Dyce said, before returning his tongue to a more normal position and grinning. “Don’t look so superior, you’d do the same thing.” He reached out and squished a mushroom in his hand, held it up triumphantly. “See? It keeps glowing once you crush it, so I thought if I ate some...”

“It’s certainly an interesting effect,” Marcurio said thoughtfully. He was getting an idea, and an erection, not coincidentally. He set the book aside and still wrapped in his robe went over to examine the mushrooms. Breaking them produced a luminescent juice that lost its glow over a few minutes. Dyce was daubing himself in the stuff gleefully, still waist deep in the spring.

“Dyce, why don’t you come over here?” Marcurio said, and squeezing the fungi, he slid three fingers into his mouth and then down his chin.

“What have you found?” Dyce asked.

Marcurio got on his knees, looked Dyce right in the eye, and slid his glowing tongue out from between his lips. He shrugged off his robe, letting it crumple on the ground somewhere behind him as a grin spread across Dyce’s face.

“I like the way you think,” Dyce said, and he left the water without hesitation, his chest and hands streaked glowing blue and violet, already starting to fade at the edges. Dyce stroked his cock a few times as he ambled over, and by the time he placed the head on Marcurio’s bright blue tongue, it was jutting proudly from Dyce’s fingers.

Dyce tasted of salt and mineral springs, and Marcurio sucked a breath in through his nose before sliding his first cock in months to the back of his mouth. Dyce sighed pleasurably, and tangled his dirty fingers in Marcurio’s hair.

Normally, Marcurio would have been silently irritated, but he was planning on getting much filthier yet. He didn’t suck, not yet, didn’t swallow before he lifted his head, cheeks hollowing as he tried to transfer as much glow as possible, a line of spit dripping from the corner of his mouth that he wiped on the back of his hand as he sat back to examine his handiwork.

Dyce’s cock gleamed, wet and faintly glowing, twitching against Marcurio’s lips.

“Never thought I’d see my dick shine,” Dyce said.

Marcurio merely lowered his head again and started sucking in earnest, letting Dyce move his head and rock his hips against his face as Marcurio held onto his arse.

Marcurio closed his eyes and savoured the weight and bulk of the cock in his mouth, his mind’s eye watching them from off to the side, illuminated by purple light, unashamed and unhidden, Dyce’s soft grunts floating on the still air. This marvellous image left him rock hard, but he ignored his cock for now, letting it nod futilely in the air and drip on the ground untouched.

He could feel Dyce getting close and he pulled off with a final suck, grabbing Dyce with one of his hands and stroking him.

“Paint me,” he said, his voice strained and rough.

Dyce. Lovely, agreeable Dyce, did as he was asked. With a final series of gasps he rocked his hips forward, one hand still on Marcurio’s head, and Marcurio shut his eyes as he felt warm, sticky ropes of come splatter on his cheek and chin and mouth and hair. Marcurio stroked him through it, and when he was done Dyce obligingly smeared the last of his spend down Marcurio’s cheek.

Marcurio opened his eyes cautiously. His instinct was to make for the spring as soon as possible, but he suppressed the urge. Dyce was watching him with an impressed expression

“Looks good on you,” he said with a pleased smirk.

“Your turn,” Marcurio mumbled, reflecting that girls tasted so much better.

Dyce got on his knees, and Marcurio indicated he should turn around. He was sure Dyce gave excellent head but he wanted to do something else. And Dyce did as he was bid. It didn’t occur to Marcurio to question his obedience, or wonder if he was incurring an obscure debt for this consideration.

Instead he plunged his hands back into the rather mangled patch of nearby mushrooms, and slapped Dyce on the arse. Disappointingly, it only left a dull streak, so he pressed his whole hand to leave a perfect print instead. Twice. He shuffled forward and nudged his cock beneath Dyce’s balls, and Dyce closed his legs, nice and tight.

“I’ve got more oil if you’d prefer to aim higher,” Dyce offered.

“I want to paint you,” Marcurio said. “This will do.” He wasn’t going to mention he didn’t want to wait any longer. Watching Dyce come had nearly brought him along too, and he started rocking his hips, sliding between Dyce’s legs, watching the hand prints fade on his arse as it slapped against his hips.

He panted, chasing pleasure without restraint as he’d already pleased his partner, his mind’s eye filling in the tableau they made from all directions. They could fuck on this same spot for a week and he didn’t think he’d tire of it.

He felt his balls tighten, the familiar cliff-edge was approaching, and he pulled himself from between Dyce’s legs.

“Roll over,” Marcurio ordered, and as did so he realised Dyce had gotten hard again, one hand stroking his own cock as he flopped onto his back, knees bent. With his other he reached for Marcurio’s and Marcurio let him. He wrapped his fingers over Dyce’s as he knelt over him, guiding him to the perfect rhythm.

“Come on,” Marcurio panted. “If you can.”

“I’m trying,” Dyce said through gritted teeth, working himself faster, his head raised to watch them both. Marcurio was now trying to hold back, give Dyce more time, but he’d left it too late, and he was coming with a choked yell, over Dyce’s stomach and chest, pale ribbons that splattered into a blue glow.

Marcurio watched, still hard, as Dyce brought himself off a minute or two later, adding to the glowing mess on his torso, relaxing back into himself with a very deep sigh. He made a lovely picture, but Marcurio couldn’t help but wonder about his own appearance. Sticky with half-dried come, Marcurio gingerly fished out his shaving mirror from his pack and examined the mess on his face. It was brighter further away from the mushrooms.

“You are _filthy_.” Marcurio jumped as Dyce appeared next to his ear, and he jumped again as he wrapped an arm around him and pulled him flush with his slimy torso.

With a strangled yell Marcurio tried to fight him off, and Dyce laughed. Neither of them had a lot of strength left, and their halfhearted wrestling turned into mutual support as they wearily stumbled back to the springs, and then to bed, too tired to speak in more than agreeable mumbles.

The upside of being underground was a complete indifference to the movement of the sun, and thus Marcurio slept as long and deeply as he pleased and Dyce didn’t wake him. When he did finally surface from slumber, it took him a little while to make sense of his surroundings and remember where he was, what he was doing, and who he’d done it with. Twice.

Dyce was already up and back in the spring, and Marcurio sat up and yawned and asked if he’d been awake long.

“You could wake me up, you know. You are still employing me.”

“You looked so peaceful, I didn’t have the heart to. Besides, I haven’t been up long. We must have walked miles and miles yesterday.”

“What are your plans for today? Do we go back to the city?”

In response Dyce took a breath and submerged. Marcurio waited for him to come up again; if he wanted the day off, that was fine. He was nominally in charge after all, and Marcurio didn’t think they’d be bored.

Marcurio was starting to get mildly concerned when Dyce surfaced, more than surfaced; he surged upwards, glowing beads of water flying as he rose from the spring like an elemental force. He raised his hands to sweep his hair out of his face, arching his back, and Marcurio appreciated every illuminated line of him, long and lean and glowing as the water fell away, skin growing dark save for the beads of moisture that ran down his arms, dripped off the ends of his hair, streaming off his chest and stomach.

It was only when Marcurio met his electric blue gaze, that he realised he was being treated to a performance. Dyce stepped up out of the spring, not breaking eye contact, while Marcurio had to struggle valiantly to do the same, as more of the Breton came on display.

“What’s this then?” Marcurio asked, Dyce leaving briefly luminescent footprints on the rock as he prowled over.

Dyce stood over him, still dripping, a truly wicked smile curling his lips; one Marcurio hadn’t seen on his face before, but oh it suited him. It was in its own way as electrifying as Marcurio’s magic, and he wondered if the hairs on his arms were standing up. His cock was certainly getting the message.

“My turn,” Dyce said in a low drawl. “Take it off, if you don’t want to get it wet.”

Marcurio had as usual slept in his robe and the air was cold as he unwrapped himself, but he expected he was going to get warmed up very soon.

Dyce nudged Marcurio’s feet apart with his own, and truthfully Marcurio was expecting it. Dyce didn’t strike him as set on one particular role, and frankly it would be a waste of a cock not to ride it at some point. Dyce had let him have it all his way yesterday so Marcurio would return the favour, although he was still confident Dyce had nothing to match his arcane skills.

Dyce knelt over him. He was warm from the spring, although the drops of water that fell from his hair weren’t. He ran his hands over Marcurio’s body, admiring it, running his thumb along his cock. Marcurio wanted to bite the smile off his face.

He patted down Marcurio’s robe until he located the bottle. So he had noticed him keep it. Marcurio refused to be self-conscious about it as Dyce smirked and slicked his cock up with a practised twist.

“I’m guessing you haven’t done this recently, given how hungry you were for this last night,” he grinned.

“I’ve done it before.”

“So you’ve implied.”

Dyce tested his confidence with greased fingers and Marcurio had to admit it had been some time, as he inhaled sharply and arched his back.

“Like that do you?” Dyce said as he withdrew his fingers. “It’s about to get better.”

“You’re very ah, confident,” Marcurio said, steadying his voice as he spoke. Dyce smiled indulgently, as he pushed himself in, nice and slow, and Marcurio’s toes dug into the ground for leverage.

Dyce held still while Marcurio breathed in and out and reacquainted himself with the sensation of receiving cock. He expected nothing else from Dyce. He was anticipating a skilled, considerate lover and he wrapped his legs around Dyce’s waist and lay back to enjoy being expertly fucked.

Dyce obliged, although Marcurio suspected he was holding himself back a little. Nevertheless he could feel his movement’s quickening and he urged Dyce on, squeezing his waist, and digging his fingers into the muscles of Dyce’s shoulders.

“Yes!” he gasped, teetering on the edge.

“No,” Dyce purred, and squeezed the base of his cock, choking off his orgasm as he stilled inside him. The smile was back. Dyce waited a bit as Marcurio relaxed and then he started moving his hips again. Marcurio decided to be a bit more active this time, squeezing down on Dyce, touching him with frosted fingers, trying to make himself outlast the thief.

He needn’t have bothered, as Dyce simply wasn’t going to let him come. Every time Marcurio felt he was going to slip over the edge, Dyce was already easing off, slowing the pace. He stopped a couple of times to reapply the oil, but otherwise he was relentless. Marcurio had lost track of time and how many times Dyce pulled him back from the brink.

Marcurio whined through gritted teeth as he felt his satisfaction recede again, and he reached for his own cock, only for Dyce to grab his wrist and pin it to the ground by his side.

“I _said_ it’s my turn,” Dyce reminded him, his voice raspy.

Dyce released his wrist and Marcurio let it lay, even as his hands formed frustrated fists.

“Very good,” Dyce said. “You get a reward.” So saying he wrapped his fingers around Marcurio’s prick.

“Please,” Marcurio begged. Dyce stroked the heated skin just the way Marcurio liked it, but about half as firmly. He realised he’d basically taught Dyce exactly what he liked the night before, and in doing so he’d given Dyce the knowledge to perfectly deny it to him.

Dyce released him and sat back, running his fingers down his own throat, and thumbed one of his nipples with a pleasured sigh while Marcurio watched and squirmed, trying to fuck himself harder without leverage.

“Why?” Marcurio groaned.

“Why play with myself?” Dyce dropped forward again, his forearms thumping into the ground on either side of Marcurio’s head, his lips against Marcurio’s ear. “Because I’m not the one on the edge of coming helplessly all over the place,” he growled.

Marcurio realised he was whimpering, trembling with lust.

“You made me come three times yesterday,” Dyce continued, and Marcurio felt the pool of precome on his stomach finally overflow his belly button and trickle down his side, as Dyce’s words coaxed his arousal up another impossible notch. “You deserve full service for that, I think.” Dyce’s hand wrapped around his cock again. “Off you go.”

He rolled his hips forward, and finally gave Marcurio’s cock what it wanted.

Marcurio yelled. Finally, finally, finally, he was coming, and even Dyce’s body weight couldn’t keep him from arching off the ground as he grabbed a fistful of Dyce’s hair. His throat was raw from moaning.

He fell back into himself, and opened his eyes. Dyce was watching him with a satisfied smile, but Marcurio realised he was still hard, his breathing mostly even. He’d let Marcurio come while he merely watched.

Marcurio demurred when Dyce raised his hand to Marcurio’s lips, the come on it glowing slightly. Dyce grinned and wiped his hand on the robe. As long as it was on the outside, Marcurio didn’t care; it got worse things splashed on it on a regular basis.

Dyce rolled his hips slightly.

“I can’t,” Marcurio panted. “Do that again.”

“I think you can.”

Marcurio had yet to go soft, and Dyce just touched him lightly, taking his time. Even as Marcurio shook his head, a decadent part of him wanted to come again, wanted to be debauched further.

“Someone might have heard,” he allowed the voice of reason one objection, but it was a very breathy, unconvincing voice.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Dyce was back in his ear again, his hair brushing Marcurio’s cheek, his hands tangled in Marcurio’s own dark locks. “For someone to hear us. You think I didn’t notice you looking around? Such a performer deserves an audience.”

“Ngh.” Divines, he wanted to come again already.

“Maybe they did hear you. Maybe they’ve been listening to us the whole time. You’re a very powerful mage, so they should be keeping their distance. But you’re distracted right now; you’ve got my cock up your arse. You wouldn’t be able to focus. You probably wouldn’t even hear them sneaking up with the noise you’re making.”

He was making noise, he realised, little needy cries were punched out of him every time the blunt head of Dyce’s cock slid to the deepest point it could reach. He wasn’t gripping Dyce with his legs anymore; they’d stopped working.

“Fuck,” Dyce breathed, his own words apparently having an effect.

“Yeah, come on. Divines, please.” It felt impossible until it wasn’t and he was suddenly rushing towards another orgasm and if Dyce cut him off he’d scream-

He screamed anyway, but at least Dyce was yelling too; the incredible self-control he’d been exercising finally giving way as he did his best to fuck Marcurio through the ground as Marcurio felt him swell and start to come and then he was lost in his own pleasure for what felt like forever, until it wasn’t.

A sweaty, sticky, breathy silence fell.

Dyce sighed and sat up off him, sweeping his hair out of his face.

“Are you alright?”

“Mm.”

“I don’t normally go that hard,” he admitted. “But you were asking for it.”

Marcurio looked up at him, “You,” he said carefully, “are the most skilled fucker I’ve ever met.”

Dyce had been regarding him with faint concern, but at his words a smile like the sun spread across his face.

“I probably am.”

Dyce got to his feet, a little unsteady. Marcurio wasn’t even going to try just yet, and Dyce brought him fresh water from their supplies and asked him if he wanted food. When he said he wanted a wash instead Dyce pulled him to his feet and offered him an arm to lean on. Marcurio accepted; he knew Dyce was keeping an eye on him, and for now he didn’t mind being looked after.

Dyce didn’t declare the day a complete write-off. He put his armour on once they’d eaten, and they packed up their gear. Sooner or later the Falmer or chaurus would find their camp, and despite what Dyce had said into his ear, Marcurio preferred to keep his exhibitionism a fantasy for now. Besides, he was still recovering from the fucking of his life, and he thought he’d be sated for a day or two at the very least.

“We are here for more than fun, I suppose,” Dyce said as he glanced back at the empty springs.

“The scroll,” Marcurio said; he’d honestly forgotten about it. “Do you actually have a plan to find this thing?”

“I feel like I’ll know it when I see it,” Dyce replied, and with these encouraging words, he set off.

There was no time for fucking about, or fucking, when they reached the city; the Falmer had made themselves quite at home, and the adventurers were obliged to be quick and quiet. Dyce pointed out they were technically the intruders here, and the Falmer kept to themselves otherwise. It didn’t seem right to slaughter them.

Marcurio wasn’t particularly bloodthirsty himself, so he didn’t have any real objections, but it meant they slept in shifts in uncomfortable places, and couldn’t linger by spectacular views or in Dwemer bathhouses. Dyce led them from one imposing public building to the next, theorising that the scroll wouldn’t just be stuffed away in someone’s house.

“The Dwemer built a machine that could copy it,” Dyce said, as they stopped to eat more of their supplies perched on a bridge overlooking the vast abyss below the city. “Septimus wants a copy; I keep the original.”

Marcurio pinched the bridge of his nose. “It’s still a terrible idea for you to even have this thing in your possession, let alone read it. Is there any way I can talk you out of this? Do you owe a debt or something?”

Dyce smiled at him in an infuriatingly affectionate way and shook his head. “I wish it was that simple. I’ve tried to wiggle out of this long enough, but I appreciate the thought.”

The first few times they couldn’t avoid encountering the Falmer they were obliged to kill them, but they both noticed soon enough they were being avoided rather than attacked. Word, it seemed, was getting around that they were not worth the trouble. Sometimes they were obliged to travel somewhere the Falmer were inexplicably protective of, but once the echoes of Marcurio’s thunder had died away it was as if the entire city had been abandoned as the residents hid.

Well, the living residents did. There was no stopping the Dwemer’s own defences.

Marcurio spent his spare time trying to find out why Dyce was so set on the scroll, without a lot of success. If he pushed the issue Dyce would crowd him against a wall and tell him what a sweetheart he was for caring so much, which invariably irritated him enough that he’d drop the subject for a while.

It was rather frustrating, in several ways. Marcurio simmered, trying to come up with a suitable response to Dyce’s expert fuck. As much as he would have enjoyed snatching brief pleasures in hidden spaces, and he suspected Dyce was waiting for him to suggest it, pride demanded something special, something more memorable, but it simply wasn’t worth the risk getting caught. At least until they came to the courtyard beneath the sun.

They’d both been looking forward to getting a better view of the thing. Marcurio didn’t know enough about the Dwemer to guess what they thought of the celestial bodies they rarely saw; he’d certainly never heard of them building a sun before.

They’d searched the vast majority of the city when they found themselves beneath the huge orb, the yellowish light it emitted giving the impression of heat, although the temperature was the same.

They stood underneath, craning their necks and squinting up at it.

“It doesn’t seem to do anything,” Dyce said.

“Maybe it’s art.” There was nothing else here, just the path to the last couple of buildings and a big illuminated space.

“Maybe it was a stage,” Dyce said.

Marcurio listened, and shielded his eyes as he peered off all around them. No sign of movement. It was now or never, and he couldn’t imagine a better backdrop.

“If it’s not it should be,” he said slowly. “It might be time for a performance.”

Dyce caught on immediately, but he looked rather dubious. “We’re kind of in the open out here. You really _do_ want an audience.”

“We’ll see anything approaching. This could be our last opportunity.”

“Or the last thing we ever do.”

“As long as my hands are free and I can see, I think we’re pretty safe.” They were circling each other as they spoke, each an expert at eye-fucking.

“I’m not getting on my back out here,” Dyce said.

Marcurio considered his options for a moment.

“Bend me over,” he said, giving Dyce a challenging smile. “Just hold me up so I can see what’s going on. I’m sure you’re strong enough.”

Dyce grinned back. “We’ll want to be quick.”

“So fuck me hard then.” He stepped up to Dyce, eye to eye. “I can take it.”

Dyce didn’t answer. Instead he took Marcurio’s face in both his hands and kissed him. His stubble was tending towards bristles by now, but Marcurio relished the sting as he hummed into Dyce’s mouth, and pressed himself against him, shamelessly angling his hip to press against his crotch.

Dyce laughed softly. “All right then, I’m convinced.”

Their packs hit the floor and Marcurio opened his robe so he could get at his belt. This was risky. Stupid even. He didn’t think anyone else in Skyrim would have gone for his suggestion. He didn’t think he’d trust anyone else enough to have made it in the first place.

“On your knees, I think,” Dyce said. He tossed Marcurio a bottle. He had much less clothing to struggle with, and Marcurio just drank him in for a few moments. That Ratway leather looked even better with the belt undone, the trousers loose on his slim hips, and his oiled and gleaming cock jutting from the open fly. He smiled as he stroked it lazily, and Marcurio did his best to commit the image to memory.

Then he remembered he was supposed to be getting himself ready for that pretty cock and he pushed his breeches down around his thighs and got on his knees. Dyce kept watch, his bow on his back, his free hand prepared to grab it and Marcurio wondered if they were being observed already and bit back a moan. His cock was dripping.

He didn’t want to wait any longer.

“Come on,” he said, and Dyce walked around behind him and knelt down. It was Marcurio’s turn to keep watch as Dyce hoisted up the robes with one hand and guided his cock with the other. Marcurio panted, holding himself upright, his hands raised, but nothing moved in the darkness beyond the glow of the sun above them. All he could hear was Dyce’s uneven breathing, and the soft sound of creaking leather.

Marcurio groaned as he felt the head of Dyce’s cock slip inside him, followed by the long glide of the rest of it. Dyce kept one hand on his hip and the other one curled around Marcurio’s chest, pulling him upright and taking some of his weight. He relaxed a little, shifting his knees to get a bit more comfortable, and nodded.

Dyce set a slow but relentless pace, and Marcurio kept his eyes open and his hands up. He was aware of the weight of the glass sun above them, the phantom heat. Let them listen, he thought, and let Dyce punch little groans out of him with every thrust. Dyce was near-silent, concentrating, and Marcurio thought it a pity their most likely audience was blind. They must have made a magnificent picture, rutting like animals under the artificial sun. He let himself make more noise, moaning and urging Dyce on. Dyce didn’t disappoint. Marcurio could feel the corded muscle in the arm across his chest, the fingertips digging into his hip, holding him still.

Dyce started rutting him a bit harder, faster, snapping his hips forward. Marcurio knew he couldn’t keep his own arms up forever, and Dyce’s was shaking with the strain.

“Please, do it,” Marcurio begged loudly. “Fuck me. Come in me, Dyce,” he knew he sounded shameless and he loved it.

“Yeah,” Dyce grunted in agreement and a few moments later hilted himself with a drawn out groan, and Marcurio dropped his hands to yank frantically on his cock as he cried out.

Dyce released him and he fell forward, catching himself with one hand and coming all over the other in hot, sticky strands, Dyce still hot and hard within him.

“Divines, _fuck_ ,” he shouted.

He was dimly aware of the whistle of arrows, and had time only to think maybe he shouldn’t have come so audibly before Dyce shoved his head down with one hand and roared.

_FUS RO DAH!_

The arrows and those who loosed them were blown back, and they didn’t return. As the echoes of Dyce’s Shout fled down the streets of the dwarven city, a ringing sound emanated from the sun, and from the darkness beyond it came an answering roar.

They were still on their knees, and they pulled away from each other, Marcurio stuffing his uncooperative cock, still mostly stiff, back into his breeches and stumbling to his feet, even as his entire body still rang with aftershocks.

“Dragon!” Dyce yelled, rebuckling.

“I can see that.”

They split for opposite sides of the courtyard as the dragon descended, jaws open. It thumped into the ground, and breathed a plume of frost. Marcurio raised his hands, and channelled the lightning.

“You’re the Dragonborn,” he said later, as they stood over the bones of the beast.

“What gave it away?” Dyce asked, the last streams of light sinking into him as he absorbed the beast’s soul.

“Is that why you need the scroll?”

“Yeah. I didn’t want to do it, but it looks like no one else can. You still want to talk me out of it?”

Marcurio sighed. “No.”

Dyce gestured towards the skeleton. “You want me to bend you over the skull?”

Marcurio laughed with surprise. “I think we’ve pushed our luck enough for one day. Next time perhaps. Let’s go and find this thing. We have to be close.”

The scroll turned out to be quite heavy and of comically large size. To Marcurio’s relief and academic disappointment, Dyce didn’t attempt to read it. They found another machine to take them back to the surface, and they stood in silence as it ascended.

Marcurio watched Dyce as he leaned against the wall, arms crossed. Dragonborn huh? Fate had a sense of humour, but he didn’t blame Dyce for not seeing the funny side of it. He’d be pissed if it had been him.

But it could be worse. Fate hadn’t made a bad choice, just an unconventional one. Dyce could probably handle it.

“Like what you see?” Dyce had caught him staring.

“I was just thinking I should hire a bard,” Marcurio mused.

“You sing your own praises well enough, oh Master of the Arcane.”

Marcurio waved his hand. “I was thinking of commissioning a few more verses for ‘The Dragonborn Comes’ myself.”

“Marcurio.”

“I know, it’s just a joke. I won’t tell anyone.”

“Thank you.”

The machine came to a halt and the doors opened to reveal a dazzling blanket of white snow on the slope before them, and to admit an icy breeze alongside it. They emerged shrugging themselves deeper into their clothes and squinting in the light.

“You should head back,” Dyce said. “I have to carry this stupid thing up to High Hrothgar. I doubt you want to come with me.”

“This is true. I’d call this job concluded.”

Dyce held out a gloved hand. “Friends?”

Marcurio took his hand and pulled, and despite the way his back protested he dipped Dyce, pack, scroll and everything, and covered his mouth with his own. Dyce kissed him back, free hand cupping his face, but Marcurio couldn’t hold him up for long and he pulled back just far enough to gaze into the Breton’s eyes.

“I don’t want to be friends,” he said. “I shall make you adore me.”

He pulled Dyce upright before he lost his grip entirely and completely ruined the moment and once he’d got his footing Dyce leaned up and pressed his lips to Marcurio’s forehead.

“You idiot. I already do,” he said, with a smile as warm as sunshine and bright as gold. He turned and started sliding down the slope north, leaving Marcurio short of breath and staring after him, his dazed smile melting into a scowl as he realised Dyce had done it _again_.

“Hey! Stop! I’m not done with you!”

“See you in Riften,” Dyce called back.

“I’ll get him for that. This is not over,” he muttered, and shouldered his pack. He had a long trek home on which to consider his next gambit.

Things were much more amicable between the resident and the regular at Bee and Barb after that, although there remained a certain competitive air between them, and lucky indeed was the approachable stranger who happened to visit on a night when both were ‘at home.’


End file.
